Deliverance
by Euregatto
Summary: "When we are born, we are all born free. But as long as we remain within these walls, our freedom will be a choice, and I have no intentions of giving up my rights without a fight. If I'm going out, I'm taking this whole damned world with me." - Eren x Annie, Slave AU, dark themes/adult themes, COLLAB with Arkevil!


**Chapter 1 - The Claiming**

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"Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the Great Walls or the public laws thereof, shall have their freedoms revoked and therefore shall be assimilated into slavery to be purchased, sold, and treated as legal property of a legal citizen. Offences of higher degree shall call forth prosecution and the right to exercise capitol punishment." - King's Ordinance XVII.78.5C

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It was raining like a tempest on the verge of forming a hurricane. Raindrops smashed against building shingles and cobblestone walkways relentlessly, the wind was threatening to blow guards from their perches uptop Wall Rose, and the clouds were depressed blankets that settled eerily across the sky.

Lightning exploded overhead as a cloaked figure pressed up against the side of a Stohess district home, right beneath the edge of the roof where the storm couldn't touch him. His palm pressed flush against a transparent window pane and he briskly soothed his damp bangs from his eyes to peer into the distilled setting inside.

It was a kitchen devoid of human life and ignited by candles placed in random corners of the room to best set it aglow. The sticks had all but burnt down to their bases, left unattended, setting the floorboards aflame with orange light.

"Empty," he mused to himself, raising his hand into the air. Behind him a chorus of heavy boots slapped against the slick pavement as his unit of soldiers advanced on cue and surrounded both exits of the building on the west and north sides.

He hesitated a beat, allowing the sound of the rainfall to drum against the distilled world around him and mingle with his own heavy breathing. Then he curled his fingers into a tight fight.

The soldiers at the front door kicked the division inwards and pooled into the home, scattering five men upstairs in the second floor, seven to the third, and four around the main level. The window-watcher and a man who had spent too many years witnessing the crumbling world around him, Captain Kitts Verman, moved into the house in their wake.

"It's clear!" Rico Brzenska called from the staircase on the top floor.

"Same!" Mitabi Jarnach added a second later from his position on the balcony above the Captain. "There's no one here!"

Kitts turned his inquisitive gaze to a soldier near the dining room who shook his head in return.

"Dammit," he hissed under his breath, tromping across the length of the kitchen into the hall. "The tip gave us these exact coordinates! We can't go back to base empty handed! Find me some scraps of fucking evidence within the next hour or I'm going to assume you're all working for the Rebellion too! Do you hear me?! It'll be the Shiganshina Slave Claim for every last one of you shitbags!"

A resounding cringe travelled through every officer and, as obscurely brash as the order was, they didn't have the nerves to voice their opinions. Opposing your superior about the issue of slavery usually earned you some months in the Sina Penitentiary, and if the outbreak became violent enough, they would put a noose around your neck and you could kiss your ass goodbye.

Rico knew better than anyone - like a preset instinct in her subconscious mind - that Kitts was no pushover either. If you said so much as 'I think slavery is wrong' something in his unstable brain would register as reasonable and he would gun you down on spot.

It was worse for the rebels. He once ordered a cannon fire on a warehouse storing escaped slaves without so much as checking inside to see what the body count was. Needless to say, there were no identifiable bodies to count in the end and for nearly three straight weeks the roads were stained with splatters of soiled blood and strips of charred human remains. She had been part of the clean up unit and stepped on what looked like some poor bastard's forearm, branded with the Mark of Slavery: a tattoo of a circular emblem with the King's initials cradled inside that is given to a registered slave during a Claiming.

He had been sold at an auction like a cow, and judging by the thin build, he had been cheap - probably used to offer 'comfort' to travelers so they would stay one night longer in their hotel room.

"Sir!"

A shout snapped Rico out of her thoughts and a moment later Kitts screamed up to her, "Rico! We found a door to the cellar; get your men and drag those terrorists out to my group!"

"Sir!" She affirmed quickly.

Nearly nine minutes after he had given his order and only about thirty seconds since she collected her soldiers from the tops floors, an explosion of shattered wood and gun shots rang out into the lurid atmosphere, sending chills as frigid as the air outside down the length of her spin. She whipped out her pistol and aimed for the very particles of dust surrounding her as she vaulted down the staircase two steps at a time.

She hit the ground floor long before the muted screams reached her ears. Reflexively she followed the noises to the broken down door at the end of the back hall near the exit.

The passage descended down into darkness illuminated by candlelight. She briskly trekked down with her group of soldiers in tow, the soles of their boots slamming against the panels of wood beneath them.

"I'm here!" She exclaimed, sprinting out into the clearing of the room, "I heard the - gun… shots…"

The corpses are bleeding out on the ground and fifteen survivors are either bound, being bound or in the process of being kicked onto their knees in a perfect line. The cellar lead up to the open back door just as Mitabi had predicted on his building blueprints and the soldiers dragged out the surviving rebels one at a time.

One soldier emerged from a back room with a struggling, gagged girl in his grasp and towed her up the steps into the storm. "Is she the last of them?" Kitts asked grimly, gesturing to the trashing teen - she was probably just seventeen or eighteen, far too young to be leading a faction of of rebels - in the officer's vice-like hold.

"Yes, sir. She put up a real hell of a fight!"

"Bring her here; let me see her face!"

When the officer had dragged the girl over and kicked out her legs so she was kneeled at Kitts' feet, the Captain grabbed her by the chin with his forefinger and thumb, forcing her to look directly up at him. He studied her for several prolonged minutes with a sinister, quizzical glare.

"You must be Annie Leonhardt… We've been looking for you." And then he added, rather arrogantly, "Guess you're not as smart as you thought!"

He got down on one knee to lower to her height. Her cobalt orbs studied him with pupils blown wide open with adrenaline. There was no fear. It amused him.

"You're a cute one, too. It would be a shame to put a noose around your neck…"

She reeled her head back as if pulling away in disgust - before colliding her skull into the tender cartilage of his intrusive face. A sickening crunch echoed out into the cellar and liquid crimson erupted from his broken nose like a geyser; he fell back, clutching at his wound and screaming an order that was muted to Annie's ears.

"You fucking bitch!" Mitabi exclaimed, driving the back of his hand across the blonde's face, her head whipping to the side upon impact and sending her crashing to the floor.

"Sell them all to the slavers in Wall Maria!" Kitts screamed, splattering blood everywhere. "And you will sell that bitch for cheap!"

Annie was already unconscious against the sodden dirt beneath their feet.

The sudden silence overwhelmed the soldiers and Rico sprinted up the staircase to Kitts in immediate response to his uproar, setting her hand against his shoulder to stabilize him. "You okay Captain?"

"Do I fucking look okay?! Fucking bitch broke my goddamn nose!"

The soldier closest to Mitabi wove his fingers into the fallen girl's golden hair and hoisted her up again. She was startled awake in response to the abrupt jolt of pain in the back of her skull and she hissed through the cloth binding between her lips.

"She's trying to say something," Rico figured, sliding the gag down over the girl's chin. "What do you have to say for yourself?"

Annie said nothing.

Kitts grasped her jawline with his bloodied hand, smearing garnet warmth across her porcelain skin, and forced her to look at him. "She gave you an order you fucking scum!"

She just gazed up at him.

There was a gleam in her eyes - a certain sheen of harmonic ignorance and confidence, like she knew something Kitts didn't. Because she knew something Kitts didn't, and it ignited an immediate chain reaction within the chemicals of his gut. His pupils dilated with a surge of realization and fear.

"RICO! GET THE MEN OUT OF THERE NOW!"

The burning rope that had been lit shortly before her capture weaved through the beams in the cellar ceiling high out of the reach of the soldiers and Rico just barely made it to the door when the barrels of gunpowder exploded. The building collapsed immediately in a surge of flames, the blast rocked every home within the district, shattering windows and sending Rico sailing across the street into an opposing wall, and shrapnel of wood and stone pelted the soldiers that had been knocked flat on their backs.

Kitts hit the ground on his side, gasping for the air that escaped his chest. The eruption raged for several minutes despite the torrential downpour of rain and he collected himself. Annie was inching away in her best attempt at making a break for it, dragging her tangled body through the mud, but Kitts had already fisted her saffron locks, hoisting her back to her knees.

She didn't have to look up to know exactly how furious he was - but he whipped her head back regardless, bringing her towards his flaming glare. Her lips parted into a menacing smirk. "Guess you're not that smart either, huh Captain?"

He released her and flipped the rifle from his back. "You're in for a world of hell, you fucking cunt!"

He drove the stock of his weapon into the point of her temple, and she fell unconscious before she even hit the ground.

Rico gasped for breath as her shattered ribs dug into her lungs, pained tears searing the cuts in her face and raw arms burning like fire as she rolled over onto her hands and knees. She turned her silvery gaze up to Kitts staring down at Annie's befallen figure.

He parted his lips.

And he screamed. Screamed at the girl for everything she's done, screamed to the charred remains of his soldiers, screamed at himself for failing to see right through her plan. He screamed even as he landed on his knees and the cataclysmic destruction raged behind him, mingling with the rain to drown out his desolate cries.

Rico folded her arm over her lips to muffle her sobs.

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"I'm home!"

The shout reverberated throughout the distilled Shiganshina home as Military Police third year officer Eren Jaeger stepped inside, kicking the front door closed with his heel. A resounding bang overlapped his call. The gradual sound of footsteps drummed against the floor overhead, moving closer to the staircase in almost perfect synchronization.

"Eren!" Carla Jaeger chimed as she rushed up to meet her son, embracing him in her arms.

"You're home early," Grisha remarked, ruffling the young soldier's hair.

Eren reflexively swatted his wrist away. "Dad," he stressed, "I'm not a kid anymore, you know."

"You're still a kid to me."

Carla pulled away from Eren and looped her arm through his. "Are you hungry? I have some croissants I made just this morning, if you want."

"Of course! It's been ages since I've had anything good. The crap they serve has about as much taste and texture as parchment."

She guided him to the table and busies herself with reheating the pastries on the stovetop, her husband seating himself at the head of the table, their son picking up the stray newspaper sheet his father has long since finished reading. The front article depicted a burning building, hand drawn by the industry's most famous artist, the bestowal of information detailing Rebellion soldiers and the ruthless general Kitts Verman's actions in stopping the threat. A rather crude rendition of the supposed leader of the terrorists - who had apparently sacrificed her own people to thwart the operation - was printed above the column.

"So Eren, any chance of a young woman in your life?" Carla asked so abruptly Eren tore his page in half with a start.

Grisha gagged on his own tongue. "C-Carla!"

"What?! I'm his mother - I have a right to know!"

"The boy just got home! Give him a break."

"It's fine Dad, and no, there isn't one. That isn't one of my top priorities right now."

Carla sighed disappointedly. "Well, you better get one soon or all the good ones will be taken! What about Mikasa?"

"Mom! No! Mikasa and I are friends - only friends."

"Maybe that boy Jean, perhaps."

"Mom, stop..."

"I just want to know whether I can count on grandchildren or not. I mean, that couple next door is right around your age and they already have a second one on the way."

"Well that couple isn't military, mother!"

"Right, that's enough," Grisha intervened. "I'll be heading into town in a few minutes to meet up with Hannes, would you care to join me? He's been asking about you and I wouldn't mind some father-son time."

"Sure, just let me take my bags to my room and we can go."

"Don't worry about it," Carla offered, "I'll take care of it. You two should go while the day's still young."

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Shiganshina seemed busier than usual, Eren told himself as he and his father traversed the winding streets lined with bustling markets. He had long since tuned out Grisha's inquiries about Military training and regulations and had his attention on every other stand that caught his eye - hand blown glass jars, dreamcatchers, fresh fruits from the southern farming towns.

"Eren? Eren, are you listening to me?"

"Wha - oh, uhm, yeah."

"Then what did I just say?"

Eren furrowed his brow in response. "Is that a trick question?"

"Typical…you haven't changed a bit." Grisha adjusted his glasses so they sat higher up on the bridge of his nose. "I was asking about your training. How has it been?"

"Tough, but it'll take more than that to stop me."

"Good to hear. How long will you be staying with us then?"

Eren pondered the question for a moment. "I hadn't really given any thought to it, but how does the rest of my-?"

"Do I hear twenty marks?! Anyone for twenty?!"

The voice boomed through the square, thick with the haughty accent of the nobles from within Wall Sina and tipped with enough authority to command the Jaegers' attentions. "Are they… bidding?" Eren figured, giving his father a sideways glance.

"It's a Claiming," Grisha replied placidly, well aware that the slave auction hadn't been operated in some time. Eren hadn't even been to one since he was a child, when we bought... The stern emotions tucked away in his eyes ebbed into something much darker at the reminder of the young woman with the crimson scarf. "Let's go, Eren."

Eren hesitated for a moment, caught up in the sudden shift in his father's attitude. "W-Wait! Dad!"

He jogged to quickly catch up and followed the older man into the forming crowd of onlookers - which, to Eren, quickly became bidders by the way they stared so intently at the stage. It was a basic platform of oak wood designed to be used for the Shiganshina Claiming Ceremony, but it had not been used for years. Eren realized with the increase in Rebellion strikes lately, there were going to more captured terrorists, and that many more slaves to be Claimed.

The man up top was notorious Nile Dawk, a dark haired, scruffy looking soldier despite his upper class position, in charge of the Military Police who occasionally took up the position as a Claiming Orator to earn some money on the side to pay for his...impressive bar tab. There is a man kneeled against the floor, stripped naked, quaking from the cold as his body heat leaves with the blood oozing from the infected gashes in his back and chest, face swelled black and blue from the beatings he had endured after the whipping.

"Dad," Eren started, "is this a Claiming?"

"Yes."

Eren frisked his gaze around, analyzing the miniscule details of the slave and the seller alike. "Just like the one we bought Mikasa from?"

"We _saved_ her," Grisha corrected firmly. "Your mother and I do not believe in trading human skin that is not yours to own."

"Do I hear thirty then?" Dawk continued persistently. "He may be broken, and perhaps older than the more youthful ones we have, but he is cheap and not beyond use!" There was a collective silence. "...Anyone? How about I lower the price again? Twenty!"

Gradually a woman in the back of the mass began to raise her hand, but the man at her side snatched her wrist from the air and pulled it flush against her side. "No," he said, "you heard him, there are better ones."

"No one wants to buy him," Eren observed aloud.

"Look at the crowd, Eren...they're mostly men. That means they're here for the females."

"What happens if no one claims him, then?" Eren pressed as he nodded towards the shivering slave.

Grisha didn't answer and turned his attention back to the pulpit. Dawk cast his gaze frantically around the faces, well aware that for every slave not sold he would lose their initial value from his overall earnings, amounts assigned to them the day before the Claiming for the Orator's reference. "Okay, how about ten? Ten, anyone, that's more than fair!"

There was an underlying desperation in his voice that was not there before.

Approximately thirty seconds of absolute silence later and little interest arisen from the crowd, Dawk exhaled an exasperated sigh and wafted his hand to the slave. "Offer passed! Bring me the next one!"

The two soldiers poised at the front of the staircase ascended the several steps onto the stage and seized the broken man by his arms. "I'm sorry," Dawk whispered to him, "I'm very, very sorry."

But the slave seemed to disregard the comment, weakened to his very bones so much that he could barely register Dawk's voice. The soldiers half-dragged half-carried him off and around to the back of the pulpit, hidden behind a boarded up wall. Only a second later did the gunshot crack through the air that Eren finally understood what his parents hated so much about these Claimings.

But they were traitors. They received what was coming to them.

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"Dad, why are we still here?" Eren asked as the soldiers proceeded to emerge with another slave. "I don't want to watch this anymore."

Grisha was glued in place despite his son's remark, calculated gaze set on Nile Dawk. "Ssh, just watch."

The next slave is a dark haired girl that is seemingly untouched, and unlike the previous man she is clothed in a ragged shirt and shorts that ride up her thighs, exposing her pallid flesh - unattractively smeared with grime, however - to the audience. She looked like she had been left alone to be bought at a higher price, and Dawk seemed eager to make her purchase a guarantee.

"I'll start this bid at thirty-five marks."

"Dad," Eren tried again, "seriously, I want to go home."

But Grisha kept his glare on the stage, on the Orator, on the slave. "Her name… is Mina Carolina." Eren gave him a sideways glance. "Her family fell sick with that flu epidemic last year. Remember that week I had gone away into Wall Rose?"

"Yes."

"I didn't think...she was such a sweet girl"-he furrowed his brow at all the possible laws she could have broken, but none that seemed in her innocent character-"what in the world did she do?"

A man in the front row raised up his hand. "Thirty-five!"

"Forty!" Another man exclaimed.

"Do I hear a forty-five?" Dawk offered.

Mina's mouth was gagged by a ragged cloth, preventing her from speaking even though she strained against the rope bindings securing her wrists together, her skin rubbed raw and inflamed with irritation. She seemed more terrified than enraged by her current position, when most slaves should be reasonably outraged by their uncertain fate, a future in the hands of a stack of money.

"Fifty-five!" A woman echoed.

"Sixty!" The man two bodies behind her shouted.

Then, finally, a jostled nobleman with the stomach of ten men raised his sausage link fingers into the air. "Seventy-seven marks for the cute one!" He declared. "Take it or leave it!"

No commoner wanted to pay more than seventy for any broken slave, not even a girl as cute as Mina, so as soon as his offer met their ears the crowd seemed to collectively back down. Dawk gave them a passive glance, and after another half minute of quiet gestured to the girl on her knees beside him. "Claimed! Take her and her lovely Lord Bart Prinsley to the tent to be branded!"

"Branded?!" Grisha retorted. "They never used to brand the slaves!"

Mina screamed into her bonds, the noises muffled so they passed as barely audible to the crowd, but when she thrashed against the soldiers as they attempted to escort her off the stage, the tallest one drove the stock of his rifle into her forehead, splitting open her brow and knocking her into the other guard's arms, unconscious.

They dragged her off around the wall. "Those fucking bastards," Eren hissed as he watched them go, but Grisha's hand on his shoulder stilled him for the time being.

"There's nothing we can do," Grisha said soothingly, but his arm noticeably trembled against his son's back. "You know well enough the consequences of defying the government…"

Eren let the emotions slide off at his father's request. "Yeah. Hey, what's a branding?"

"It is what it sounds like," he answered. "The slaves are burned with the insignia of the family that buys them at a Claiming. It must be a new rule they applied just recently to regulate the slaves that are caught after running away."

"Bring me the next slave!" Dawk called out to the guards as they finally rounded back, another body already in their grasp.

She was a petite girl despite clearly being almost fully mature, her angelic blonde hair plastered to the depressions of her temples, the blood from the wound in her brow caked across her features, her clothes shredded. The girl struggled wildly all the way up to the stage, her hands bound by the same rope as Mina but with double the loops, possibly to keep her from slipping out with all of her untamed thrashing, and the rag in her mouth is fastened with a belt, probably to keep her from biting down on her tongue if worse came to worst. The guards kicked out her knees and slammed her into the floor.

Dawk chuckled humorlessly. "Looks like we've got a lively one here folks! Fresh from the heart of Wall Rose, this little spitfire caused quite a mess just a few nights ago! But what else would you expect from a leader of a terrorist faction?"

"Dad," Eren said, "it's… that girl from the newspaper, the one who blew up that hideout and killed nearly thirty people."

"Lets get this show on the road! The bid starts at 100 marks!" Dawk declared.

And he didn't know what happened right then and there, but something exploded through his father's veins, overriding all sound logic he could possibly have. Grisha's hand shot up in the air. "100 marks!" He shouted.

"Dad!" Eren hissed. "What the hell are you doing?!"

"We should've just gone to meet with Hannes," Grisha whispered to himself, cursing his fatal lack of judgment and overall horrendous decision making skills. "Carla is going to make me sleep in the basement for this…"

"110!"

"120!" Grisha countered. "We saved Mikasa…we should've saved Mina...we are going to save her!"

Eren pursed his lips. "But she's a terrorist."

"No one deserves the life of a slave, Eren, not even her."

"She murdered thirty people: soldiers and her own faction included."

"What I said still stands."

Somewhere in the background, a blood-curdling scream exploded from the smith's tent, ripping its way through the air and racking Eren down to his core. The blonde slave on the pulpit recognized it as Mina because she immediately broke from the guard's holds and leapt to her feet, ramming her skull into the chin of the shorter soldier and sending him sprawling back with a fractured jaw.

As she made a break for the steps the taller guard slammed her into the tier, one knee in her back and his hands placed on the back of her head and shoulder, respectively.

The crowd broke into an entourage of yelling and giddiness, bids placing higher and higher, increasing on a steep slope from almost forty marks at a time.

_"260!"_

_"300!"_

Dawk frantically tried to keep count of the offers coming his way. Grisha bit his lips in thought. "I don't have enough money to compete with them," he remarked to his son.

_"365!"_

_"I'm going for 410!"_

"But I do," Eren ushered, throwing his hand up into the air. "I'm bidding 500 marks!"

A few are daunted by his sudden jump into the next hundreds and now only a few voices remain.

"Eren!" His father seethed. "What are you doing?! That's your military allowance!"

_"550!"_

_"580!"_

"You want to save her," he said, raising his hand again, "and so do I. I BID 680 MARKS!"

A silence settled across the mass. The number was a lump sum of his military check and Grisha's own two-hundred fifty residing in his wallet. Dawk parted his lips to say something, anything, in response to a higher number, but those marks were already something to behold, and no one seemed to be objecting. "W-Well then, for 680 marks, this feisty young slave is yours to take home!" He strode several steps down the stage and kneeled down to the slave's height. "You girly...have just made enough for me to live comfortably for a long while to come.

The remaining guard managed to man handle her off the stage by himself with his dazed friend limping behind him, and all the while the girl's glaciate eyes never left Eren.

"Bring me the next slave!"

Grisha pinched the bridge of his nose. "I hope you know what you've gotten yourself into."

"Me?! You're the one who started bidding!"

"Your mother is going to kill us."

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**Author/Intern/Slave's note:**

The only commission where I get hounded on until 4 in the morning. Arkevil basically dictated the story (with lots of intern input from me sssh). I suffered through her wacky sleep and hallucinogen schedule and strange need to have Hannes and Grisha being gay, and stubborn as fuck attitude to make this story real. Somehow. It somehow happened. Yes it is ongoing and yes it is Ereannie. Ironic how I, Euregatto, am a slave/intern forced to write a fic about slaves. Goddammit Arkevil. Arkevil is the Christopher Nolan of Deliverance. I am the Hans Zimmer of Interns everywhere and that one person who gets coffee for everyone of Deliverance.

Arkevil: "I didn't get my fucking coffee…"

Euregatto: "I got you a fucking Christmas gift tis the season."

Arkevil: "I will slit your throat and watch as you bleed out all over your bed sheets. Merry Christmas."

Euregatto: "But then you won't have me to write this!" D:

Arkevil: "I will get PrimaMalum to write it"

Euregatto: "But he's not me. Instantly not as great."

Arkevil: "Aye, but I wouldn't be writing it…"

Euregatto: "IT IS FOUR IN THE MORNING I AM NOT HAVING THIS CONVERSATION WITH YOU."

Arkevil: "Lets fucking post this then!"

Euregatto: "Fucking hell woman." /)_o "At least give me SOME street credit for my work in the beginning…"

Arkevil: 'Get your street talk outta here..I'm Murican."

Euregatto: "Bitch you white."

Arkevil: "And PROUD"

Euregatto: *rides an eagle into the sunset with explosions and guns waving the flag*

Arkevil: "^ Accurate."

Euregatto: *OVER MOUNT RUSHMORE*

Arkevil: "Fuck Rushmore...you mean space?"

Euregatto: "I'm a hardcore 'murican. LETS GO TO THE SUN."

Arkevil: "We will ride the Icarus II…"

Euregatto: "But hopefully not die. Someone needs to finish this story."

Arkevil: "Agreed now lets post this bitch finally..."

Euregatto: *qwops into the night*

Ps: SOMEONE SAVE ME. PLEASE. SHE'S CRAZY.


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